Search process shows the Red Sox want a manager, not a sheriff

Associated PressPete Mackanin has served as an interim manager for both the Reds and Pirates but has never served full-time in the role. He has been Charlie Manuel's right-hand man in Philadelphia since 2009. Mackanin also was the Pirates' bench coach from 2003-05 and the Expos' third-base coach from 1997-2000. He managed 13 minor league seasons and is a managerial candidate in Boston.

Asked on Monday why he wanted to manage the Red Sox, Pete Mackanin said, who wouldn't?

Answer: anyone who thinks he has a shot at the Cardinals job.

Boston's early candidates are Mackanin and Milwaukee hitting coach Dale Sveum. There may be others, but the star quality of prospects already ground through the rumor mill (Joe Torre, Bobby Valentine, Tony La Russa) isn't there.

That's OK. Terry Francona was not a glamour choice, and he did fine until a few pitchers thanked him by wiping their feet on him.

In reality, the Red Sox job is a man-eating assignment that has devoured many of its lucky winners. The search process indicates that a reputation for discipline - a new sheriff in town - is not high on the checklist, if it is there at all.

Mackanin has been an interim manager with the Pirates and Reds. The experience was so life-changing that in talking to media Monday, the Phillies bench coach momentarily forgot he had done it.

Sveum, who might also be a candidate for Theo Epstein's Cubs, was an interim manager with the Brewers. He has also served in that graveyard for reputations, the Red Sox third-base coaching box.

His assets include a history of owning up to his mistakes. It is an interesting way to judge a manager, and more realistic than to expect he will never make any.

Without previous big league managing experience (and interim does not count), there is no way to gauge a man's ability to enforce rules.

Asked if he were a player's manager or a disciplinarian, Mackanin said he was both. Such diplomacy is more needed to solve the nation's deficit reduction crisis than to manage the Red Sox.

As mousy as Mackanin's straddle might sound, it was the right answer. The man has yet to get the job, let alone sit down with the guys who apparently cannot monitor themselves.

The Red Sox appear to be conducting this search exactly as they did in 2003. They continue to boil down baseball to a form of science.

Mackanin compared the interview session to a laboratory, during which he fielded a battery of questions. To the outsider, it sounds as if the job will go to the guy with the highest test score, not the most experienced candidate, and certainly not the most dynamic.

Under this system, Casey Stengel would have spent his career on unemployment, but it worked with Francona and could work again.

Skill at discipline cannot be judged unless a candidate with previous big-league managing experience emerges. That is starting to look unlikely.

Maybe an iron fist is an overrated part of all this, a reaction to a controversy whose time will pass.

That is what the Red Sox are counting on, for there is no computerized answer for who can lay down the law.